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Research Highlights

Oceanus Magazine

Elizabeth Spiers

Grits, storms, and cosmic patience

May 29, 2025

As storms stall liftoff, Europa Clipper Mission Team member Elizabeth Spiers patiently awaits the biggest mission of her life

kelp farming

Seeding the future

May 21, 2025

New WHOI tech lends a hand to kelp farmers

Julia Guimond (Photo by Brady Clarke © Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.)

Cold, quiet, and carbon-rich: Investigating winter wetlands

May 7, 2025

A hydrologist takes on a groundbreaking study to understand how groundwater moves through New England salt marshes in the winter.

mROV concept rendering

New underwater vehicles in development at WHOI

April 30, 2025

New vehicles will be modeled after WHOI’s iconic remotely operated vehicle, Jason

Learning to see through cloudy waters

April 3, 2025

How MIT-WHOI student Amy Phung is helping robots accomplish dangerous tasks in murky waters

News Releases

SOI Collaborating with WHOI on World’s Most Advanced Deep-diving Robotic Vehicle

December 5, 2013

Schmidt Ocean Institute (SOI) has begun working with the Deep Submergence Laboratory at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) to design and build the world’s most advanced robotic undersea research vehicle for use on SOI’s ship Falkor. The new vehicle will be capable of operating in the deepest known trenches on the planet, including the nearly 11,000-meter-deep Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench. The design will capitalize on lessons learned from past WHOI vehicle designs, as well as advanced technologies developed for DEEPSEA CHALLENGER, the submersible and science platform that explorer and director James Cameron piloted to Challenger Deep in 2012 and donated to WHOI in 2013.

Research Enables Fishermen to Harvest Lucrative Shellfish on Georges Bank

April 10, 2013

Combined research efforts by scientists involved in the Gulf of Maine Toxicity (GOMTOX) project, funded by NOAA’s Ecology and Oceanography of Harmful Algal Blooms (ECOHAB) program, and administered by the National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS), have led to…

Scientists Use Marine Robots to Detect Endangered Whales

January 9, 2013

Two robots equipped with instruments designed to “listen” for the calls of baleen whales detected nine endangered North Atlantic right whales in the Gulf of Maine last month. The robots reported the detections to shore-based researchers within hours of hearing…

WHOI Scientists and Engineers Partner with World-Renowned Companies to Market Revolutionary New Instruments

July 19, 2012

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) researchers have partnered with two companies to build and market undersea technology developed at WHOI: the Imaging FlowCytobot, an automated underwater microscope, and BlueComm, an underwater communications system that uses light to provide wireless transmission of data, including video imagery, in real or near-real time.

New Robot Sub Surveys the Deep off the Pacific Northwest

August 8, 2008

Scientists and engineers from WHOI and the University of Washington have successfully completed the first scientific mission with Sentry, a newly developed robot capable of diving as deep as 5,000 meters into the ocean. The vehicle surveyed and helped pinpoint several proposed deep-water sites for seafloor instruments that will be deployed in the Ocean Observatories Initiative.

News & Insights

WHOI builds bridges with Arctic Indigenous communities

February 10, 2021

NSF program fosters collaboration between indigenous communities and traditional scientists, allowing WHOI’s autonomous vehicles to shed light on a changing Arctic

WHOI-assisted study finds ocean dumping of DDT waste was “sloppy”

October 29, 2020

An investigative report this week in the LA Times features the work of WHOI’s marine geochemistry lab in identifying the discarded barrels and analyzing samples from the discovery.